From a Teacher,

It may come as a surprise to you, or it may not if you’ve been paying attention to this country over the past 20 years, that the majority of our problems as a society can be directly correlated to the break down of the family. This has been the premiere criticism of minority communities when crime stats in the United States are discussed and when pundits / talking heads exhaustively attempt to explain the problems facing the specific communities. I do not think it is an unimportant viewpoint. I do, however, think that the problem is more politically obvious within the middle class as a whole. Perfectly illustrated by our government when we are adults and by our school system when we are children. We simply don’t understand family but we desperately want it.

Firstly, it is important to understand that while politicians laboriously explain to their droves of admiring fans that everything is going to be better once we start manufacturing goods again, what they are doing is drawing a symbiotic relationship between the economy and the family. I am not naive enough to assume that financial strain doesn’t have a detrimental effect on a family as the two are not mutually exclusive. Therein lies the problem. They play such a large role in one another that there is no distinction. What needs to occur to fix the problem is simple; one simply needs to outshine the other and become the backbone for the other. How does that happen? Easy. Basically; teach your kids to work, to ask for nothing, to expect nothing and to have a desire to achieve which rivals and prevails against their own dreams, thus facilitating them. Let American families dictate their own lives and the economy will follow. But teach students about the changing economic landscape first. I address that in the last two paragraphs of this post. The problem is that we can’t even understand our own economy as I mentioned earlier in this paragraph, let alone our own families. We are under the thumb of the idea that we don’t make anything in this country anymore and therefore we are failing as a whole and that the American family is suffering by proxy. As pointed out by Kevin D. Williamson in the March 28th issue of the National Review:

“Americans have false beliefs about manufacturing for a few reasons: One is that while our factories produce much more than in the past, they employ fewer people; another is that we tend to produce capital goods and import consumer goods — you won’t see much labeled “Made in the USA” at Walmart, but you’ll see it on everything from the aircraft flown by foreign airlines to the robotics in automobile factories overseas.”

America produces and continues to produce. What this country is not producing anymore are people who have a vision for their own futures which conform to the realities of a constantly changing marketplace. In my view, this is principally because; Americans no longer have a concrete idea of family let alone it’s importance. If they did, they’d be more concerned with how to produce and compete in the future, in anticipation of being able to afford and care for a family rather than hanging on to assembly line jobs which are rapidly disappearing. Case in point; the liberal left. Regardless of progressive rhetoric and an overall whiny narcissism, the greatest achievements of the American left in recent times have been: the legalization of same-sex marriage and ersatz nationalized healthcare. The ideas of a progressive may stand in stark contrast to the ideas of a cultural or even philosophical conservative, but their ideals are oftentimes more similar than either would like to admit. Ideals concerning the desire for stability and extolling the virtues of normalcy and family. The fact is; regardless of changing the variables in the institution of marriage, the initiative to make gay marriage part of the norm in this country was purely based on the belief that all people should benefit from family. It was blanketed in, “equality” when in truth it was practically driven by it being more of a tax issue than anything else. But consider for a moment the relation between equality and family. Both are so sought after in this country that we are all convinced we know what each term means to a letter. However, if that were the case, gay marriage would have never been an issue. We are a long way from consensus. Two fathers, two mothers, three fathers, a mother two fathers and the electrician, whichever recipe creates a family is a-ok in the mind of a progressive. The question at that point has to be; are these people really interested in changing the family dynamic permanently or are they simply looking for a dynamic which makes sense to them because they have an overwhelming desire for family? We are by and large, a royally confused country.

When it comes to healthcare in this country; the progressive left has decided that the government has the responsibility to care for it’s citizenry’s health. This belief should not shock anyone not aligned with the left’s agenda. For years, minorities living in cities which mine as well be Democratic citadels, have been told that they are screwed from the moment they are born for no other reason than they were born. (I am not going to examine racism in the United States in this post, that can come at another time.) We are told constantly by politicians that we are incapable of making our own decisions. After a long enough exposure to that sort of spirit crushing condescension, it is natural for a person to start to believe it. When it comes to ObamaCare, the powers that be, have convinced themselves that they are working for a greater benevolence, a common good, which is worth the disenfranchisement of nearly half the country who simply didn’t want the law in the first place. The realities of ObamaCare are far more polarizing than unifying. It is true that people’s wages have gone down on account of it. It is true that people who would otherwise not receive certain treatments have benefited from the current system. What is also true, however, is that regardless of the flowery language used by both sides of the aisle; America is not supposed to be a day care. If nothing else, America is supposed to offer equal opportunity under the law, dictated by the auspices of personal freedom and guided by the stark, unpleasant realities of the decision making process of personal responsibility. No more, no less. I’m sorry, but the government is not your family, no matter how much you’ve been brainwashed into thinking it should be.

So Where do schools come into play?

From the very beginning we send our children to school with the hope that they become complete adults one day. The child is put into groups, categorized immediately. Grade, class, activity group, lunch rotation, team, club, new school with different categories, class based on ability, college prep, honors, high honors, teams, clubs, new school with different categories, dorm, grade, class, declared major, fraternity/sorority, teams, clubs, organizations, etc. Confusing, right? Add on top that through the entirety of the student’s academic career, they are being told that they are a, “school family” and not only will you have one confused child, but unless they go home to a relatively classic, stable home-life, they will organically come to the false realization that families are extensively compartmentalized and tracked. Kids are not being taught about the ever changing American marketplace. Kids are not taught about how to compete within their own classrooms anymore. Academically, our students suffer because of the lack of attention to how the child operates when they are not being shuffled around a school like cattle. In my time as a teacher, I have noticed one startling thing. The students who do the best academically when it comes to testing are the students who are the worst at working on their own when it comes to any assignment where they are told to be creative. They are experts at following directions but are helpless when given a topic, piece of paper, pen and a half hour to free-write something about it. That doesn’t bode well for a country let alone a rapidly changing and expanding global market.

We tell children that they are part of a larger school family, yet families are supposed to nurture children and provide for their futures. My students can tell you how to graph a polynomial, but none of them can tell you how to lay out a budget. They can tell you what the names of the different accent marks are in French, but can’t tell you how to make french fries. Is this the fault of the schools? Partly. We are not taking the precious amount of time we have with students and utilizing it to teach real world skills eventually moving into instruction about the wilderness of the future American economic landscape. We are teaching kids about which car reaches Dallas first from New York. So as educators, what is our responsibility when it comes to preparing a child to grow, mature and eventually be able to support their own family? To create a generation of kids who aren’t enthralled by the prospect of a society’s glamorized vision of socioeconomic, evolutionary regression. What are a couple of the many important responsibilities of the family? The responsibility of the family is to firstly, exist. Secondly, be special enough for the student/child to not only draw a clear distinction between, government, school, organization and family, but want to draw that distinction. The best education starts at home.

That is not on me, as a teacher.

Families clearly need to do their jobs, too. But how can they? The institution is so ethereal at this point we’re not even sure what it is anymore.

With the GOP race to the nomination now down to three men, it is becoming clear which routes each candidate needs to take in order to secure the nomination and all roads lead to a brokered convention. Which isn’t the worst thing in the world but it does reflect poorly on the party in the eyes of the nation. In any other cycle, this election is a virtual layup for the GOP. This year however, the GOP has done what it does best; shot itself in the foot.

A question that I can’t seem to answer or find a sufficient answer to; why, with all of the plethora of polling data available showing Trump as the weakest candidate in the general election, do those who claim to be the most angry support him? Wouldn’t it stand to reason that the anger would galvanize support around the clear favorite in the general? It didn’t. Resoundingly. It would be too easy to simply blame willful ignorance. Marco Rubio was ultimately done in by his own campaign’s lackadaisical attitude towards the election itself. Not setting up shop in any of the important early primary states was a product of the campaign’s belief that Marco was anointed years before any of this began after ousting Crist in Florida.

The answer to the, ‘why do the angry…’ question is all of a sudden crystal clear today. The anger of the Trump crowd is pointed directly towards… drum-roll, please; their own party. Which I suspect we all knew already. Have you ever noticed that the fights you get into with friends and family are almost always ten times more vicious than fights that you get into with people you don’t care all that much about? The fights within our own groups are vicious because each member involved feels personally attacked, regardless of the authenticity of the claim. It feels better, more satisfying  to punch your friend for doing something which you feel betrays the friendship than it does to punch a stranger who picks a fight with you. Trump supporters feel betrayed. They feel let down. They feel completely disenfranchised by the leaders they had chosen to bring about a united effort against the Obama administration.

This is expressly the fault of Mitch McConnell and  Paul Ryan, in my opinion. McConnell has done nothing but disappoint in his tenure as Senate majority leader. Ted Cruz’s pointing out of McConnell’s penchant for stooping to Harry Reid’s level, while accurate to a certain extent, was a tremor in the discord earthquake which would give rise to the Trump tsunami. That coupled, of course, with Ryan’s caving to Democrats at every turn, supporting bailout after bailout and helping to push a spending bill which supported Planned Parenthood as recently as last October, did a tremendous amount of damage to the conservative brand. The final straw for many, was the disastrous budget deal of last December in which Ryan frantically tried to assure conservatives that there were certain policy victories hidden within. That’s not enough, Mr. Speaker. I don’t blame Republicans for being angry. I am too. However, this throwing the baby out with the bathwater approach speaks volumes about the anger which fuels Trump supporters. Anger, when channeled and focused is an amazing motivator. When it is unchecked, nebulous and is given a figurehead who is brilliant at interweaving deep-seated prejudice into an overall message which reinforces a false narrative, it is down right scary.

The disenchantment with the GOP cannot be completely to blame for Trump’s rise. It is quite simple and has been pointed out by various media outlets already. It is a combination of 5 things;

1. Unlimited free air time from major networks.
2. A sense of being fed up with political correctness propagated by their own side.
3. The unfounded belief that Americans (who are currently screaming for higher minimum wage) will take the low paying jobs that illegals normally take.
4. A cringed feeling of world-wide ridicule at our perceived ineptitude in dealing with anything which doesn’t have to do with overreaching social policy.
5. Prejudice.

Now, I am not going to pretend that I don’t somewhat agree with number 4. The United States has routinely, over the past 7 years, shown that we are willing to prefer a lessened status among world powers in exchange for being cast in a more favorable light by countries which couldn’t care less about us in the first place. In the end, Trumpism is more about sticking it to the GOP than it is about any sort of vision for the future. They want to hurt their tribe more than they want to hurt the other. They expect disappointment from the other tribe. Whenever someone becomes overly emotional about a particular candidate rather than the principals by which that candidate would govern, the concern is there in spades. It is the only rational explanation for the complete denial of polling data that shows Trump supporters that their candidate is a huge embarrassment in November.

Either that or its that pesky number 5, rearing it’s ugly head again. But I’m pretty sure most Trump supporters would respond to that much like the boiler plate answer given to the umpteen million questions asked of the closet racist about the hypothetical Black family moving in down the street; we’ll talk about that when we’re alone. 

 

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Last night I was thrust into a conversation about conservatism with an absolute stranger on Twitter. Now, if you have twitter you know that you are not required to respond to anyone, at any time, at all. However, if you know me, you know that I don’t have the ability to stifle myself. As you can see from the screenshot below, it was going nowhere. The question which I answered was, “what is conservatism?” My response; equal opportunity for everyone under the law.

The conversation went nowhere as you can plainly see. This Rhodes Scholar took a page from the, “keep asking questions in an attempt to seem interesting” play which was perfectly illustrated by Steve Carell in, ‘The 40 Year Old Virgin.’ However, the question got me thinking; what is conservatism? Or more importantly, what do people incorrectly see as conservatism?

My party is in complete disarray and is essentially handing the Democrats the White House this year. There is time to turn that around, however that time is rapidly running out. The word, “conservative” is a punchline now. As comedian, author and generally whiney white guy, Michael Ian Black tweeted yesterday; “conservatism is built on protecting white people.” This interpretation initially made me chuckle until I thought to myself; ‘with the advent of DJT’s idiotic fear mongering and vitriol, who could blame him for thinking that?’

Marco Rubio has beautifully explained during a number of debates what conservatism is: limited government, the chances offered to citizens through free enterprise and a strong national defense. He is absolutely right, however, the problem is that is a dissection of political conservatism. If the GOP is to survive the current civil war in which we find ourselves, it needs to embrace the idea that there MUST be a clear distinction between political conservatism and cultural conservatism. It must also recognize that the majority of conservatives are being misrepresented by a pack of rabid nativists. My definition can be found in the screenshot. Cultural conservatism is simply this; the belief that each individual should be held accountable for his or her own actions and the course of his or her own lives and that the course of their lives should not in any way be determined by government, period.

Until the American people understand the difference and see the difference in their candidates we will have more and more Donald J. Trumps cropping up to seemingly clarify, to the horror of some and delight of others, what conservatism truly is.

And that is scary.

 

 

Last night saw Donald Trump perform relatively well in the Super Tuesday contest. Why only relatively well? Because I, personally, thought he was going to sweep with the possibility of maybe losing Texas. There is no denying that he is the man to beat at this early yet mathematically important stage of the game. In this post I will attempt to explain what I took out of last night and what the GOP candidates need to do to derail the con-man in the hairpiece. So who will win the Republican nomination? It’s tricky and nothing is certain as of this moment, no matter how much Breitbart, Drudge and Fox news want you to believe it is.

Marco Rubio: Desperately needs to win his home state of Florida. If current polls are any indication of what might happen; it looks like Trump wins handily. However, we must examine who the polls are questioning. Florida is a closed primary. Which means that polling, “likely voters” and “people who identify as conservative / Republican” is much different than asking registered Republicans. There isn’t enough time to register in the Republican Party if your intention was solely to vote for Trump. So I am dubious of the polls, however not to the point of consolation. Rubio did a bit better than I would have bet two days ago. He took Minnesota and was incredibly competitive in a couple other states with Virginia as the prime example. He can put the blame squarely on Kasich’s shoulders for the loss of Virginia. Rubio has said that he will take this to the convention floor if need be and will not give up the fight until Trump is dethroned. I would like to believe him but it is fairly obvious that March 15th will tell the tale for his campaign. At that point, suspension of the campaign would make sense if he is hoping to mount another attempt in four years.

Kasich / Carson: Go away. Your campaigns are hurting the party and are painfully obvious. They are massive fundraising entities and nothing more. They add nothing to debate any longer. They have no chance and in their better moments I would wager that neither of them are even thinking about the campaign in any sort of forthright way any longer. They need to go and go soon. They have vowed that they won’t which is awful news for the GOP but they haven’t felt the full pressure of the RNC… yet.

Cruz: He hit his peak last night. Unfortunately, taking OK along with TX. I would have preferred a Trump sweep if only to force Cruz to understand that he has not path forward and drop out. A Rubio/Cruz ticket is what The Donald fears the most. A Cruz/Rubio ticket would only stand to be an annoying warm up before he takes on Hillary. He lost his meal ticket with Evangelicals in the SEC. They flocked to Trump. Proving what we have known about Evangelicals all along; they’re the flimsiest kind of Christian. How so? Ask them what they feel about abortion and then ask them to explain Trump’s stance on Planned Parenthood. Then ask them to justify their votes. Make sure you have a bucket and a mop handy if you do, however. His two wins will fuel his fire a little longer unless the projected March 15 polls and enough pressure from Reince can force his suspension. It is highly unlikely. Anyway, he’s done in any real capacity aside from being the key to derailing Trump.

What does the GOP need to do? So, the next two weeks will need to be watched closely. Pressure from the RNC and from conservative PACs need to do whatever is necessary within moral reason in order to convince the two albatrosses to drop from the race. It also needs to convince Cruz of the possibility of a very disappointing showing on March 15th which would spell career suicide for him for the foreseeable future. It needs to coalesce behind Rubio.

What do the anti-Trump people need to do? Forget about trying to convince Trump supporters about the fact that their candidate is more liberal than conservative, the fact that he is a liar, the fact that he is a hypocrite, the fact that he doesn’t have a single comprehensive policy and understand that the majority of them are simply fed up with the government. Don’t even attempt to explain the irony of that to them or you will be told that you and “yer ten dollar college words can go on an’ git!” (That was a joke, relax.) We need to keep up the intense ridicule of the candidate himself, not of them. This is not a war against other Americans. This is a war against one American. A hateful, misogynistic, selfish American. And if the worst should happen and he gets the nomination, which will lead to the loss of the WH, Congress and SCOTUS, it will not be their fault, it will be his.

We’ll see.

Last night I was listening to, “Where We Live” on WNPR. If you are unfamiliar with it; it is a radio show that covers issues here in the Constitution State. Covered fairly, without bias, completely even keeled, by a panel of 3-4 rabid liberals. Because in CT, liberal = fair.

Unless you purposely avoid politics (and who could blame you for that?) you’ll be aware of the fact that the majority of if not all liberal pundits advocate for a larger, more intrusive government. At this moment, Bernie Sanders is gaining popularity among the perpetually naive, the blissfully ignorant and the perennially whiny. Sanders is a far-left socialist who in his 9 years in the senate has accomplished virtually nothing. He’s old, looks like a dishrag your grandmother started using in 1974 and sounds like a character in a Jackie Mason skit. So why is this guy popular? Easy answer: he is making flowery promises that he could not possibly keep. Free college, free healthcare, free, free, free. His appeal is mainly with college-aged kids and those who contribute absolutely nothing to society. Big government, nanny-state, empirical evidence-ignoring socialism. And the crowd goes wild. The crowd who painfully does not understand that because of the fact that we have a Congress, a Sanders presidency would be 4 years of sitting around staring at each other with occasional, “check and see if he’s still breathing” queries. Sanders, has been discussed a few times on, “Where We Live” and although the majority of the talking heads on that show are desperately pulling for H, the ideas and notions of how CT should be run fall in line quite easily with some of Sanders’ campaign talking points. So last night made me almost crash my car with bewildered laughter.

Apparently, our governor, Dannel P. Malloy has floated an idea which would expedite vehicle registration in the state of CT. Namely; he would like to allow entities such as AAA to handle registrations. He would also make it possible for motorists to register their vehicles even if they have outstanding tax bills. I can see how that might be troublesome, as municipalities would suffer due to people registering and then simply waiting ages to pay their taxes. I admittedly do not know all of the details of this proposal but I assume that a registration obtained while a tax bill is still floating out there in the ether would be very, very temporary. At least until the tax balance is cleared. Lets look at that first part again. Allowing people to register at someplace other than the DMV would be absolutely wonderful. The excuse that Malloy is using is noble in its advocacy of convenience; it would make the DMV a less horrific place to visit. Multiple visits for a single registration due to tax variables would be essentially negated and the traffic flow to the DMV would be cut due to people heading to Triple A instead. Sound good? Good. Every single goober on last night’s show, including the insufferable Colin McEnroe, gushed over this idea. As did everyone who heard the show because lets face it, the DMV is awful.

What they did, however, in their lauding of this particular idea was inadvertently advocate for the semi-privatization of a system which has been run by the government for the following reasons:

1. It’s more efficient
2. It’s more convenient
3. People supremely dislike the current system

Wow. Let that sink in. In a way, they brought into question the entire purpose of the DMV and in their praise of Malloy’s plan have created an almost airtight argument for the DMV’s dissolution. THE IRONY ACTUALLY HURTS MY BRAIN. Now, Triple A is non-profit so therefore it is not full privatization but it is essentially the exact same thing. What is being said quite clearly is; let someone other than the government handle the things that matter to us.

If we look at CT liberals as a sampling of the rest of the liberals in the country we can see a hypocrisy which seems to be the bread and butter of the socialist-leftist movement. Namely this; advocate socialist policy in order to secure an emotional electorate and then when it falls apart rely on the private sector to bail them out because there will always be some evil capitalist who wants to cash in on the fallout. The only problem for the socialist is that when the capitalist takes over to limit the damage/clean up the mess, the system they create usually ends up being superior to the initial govt. regulated system. That fact isn’t optimal to the liberal. So they don’t really like to mention it.

I have to apologize for one thing however. It’s not fair to the rest of the liberals in the country to lump them in with ours here in CT. Ours are a particular brand of stupid, self-righteous elitists which are actually something to behold. So, sorry for that.

The world lost an iconic rocker the other day. No, not Lemmy. Sorry. David Bowie. I myself am not a huge Bowie fan but it is hard to be a fan of rock and roll and not at least have a modicum of respect for what the man created. I was talking to my father about this last night and he brought up a good point. His point was that if you asked twenty people on the street to name five Bowie songs you might only get two or three who could name more than one or two. So the question is; what was Bowie’s appeal?

The answer is a lot simpler than you may think. Like him or love him, you have to admit that Bowie was essentially a cartoon. However, he was a cartoon that was part of something dark, mysterious, taboo and exclusionary. He was part of the underground in a time frame that spanned two decades whose sole purpose was to highlight and celebrate excess. In a time where openly singing about drugs, cross-dressing on stage and all of the snap crackle and pop of early punk rock shows were the norm, Bowie was involved in another realm which seemed to smuggly smirk at the rest of the music world. Like he and his friends knew something that the rest of us would never know.

Iggy Pop, Brian Eno, Lou Reed, Bowie, Burroughs, Warhol… you put those guys in the same room and something horrifically wonderful is going to happen. And it did. Bowie and his colleagues don’t stand the test of time because of their pedestal created by pretentious hipsters, who as of this moment are probably maniacally trying to get every Bowie EP and LP every made on vinyl into their studio apartments in the East Village. They stand the test of time because they simply didn’t care. They were part of a subculture (I really hate that word) which required a, “come as you are” lifestyle and demanded an, “I don’t give a shit” attitude for entry. It was a group of caricatures brought together by a desire to push boundaries which was almost as pressing as their drug habits. They also had a common theme; music. Or to a more pointed extent; performing and art. People looked up to that crew even if they didn’t agree with what they stood for or condoned their actions.

So in the end it is sad that he is gone. But what is more upsetting is that there is no more underground. Music today doesn’t have that bizarre crew somewhere off in the wings practicing and doing lines before a show in a relatively small club or concert hall. A bizarre crew whose influence in that small venue rivals that of the headliners in the biggest arenas. The closest we have today is who? Miley Cyrus? Someone ought to tell her that things aren’t scandalous when they’ve been laboriously planned by a production team. To her fans; no, you are not complex, unique or “quirky.” You’re just whiny. There are no more Ziggy Stardusts.

Music, for a pop star, has become a paycheck and an opportunity to blame being an asshole on the media so that one day they can apologize for their crass and outlandish behavior and make a Christmas album when they need tax money. For Bowie and the rest of that odd gathering of artists, it was always about being an asshole first, blaming bad dope procured for them by the people who cut their checks, never apologizing because an apology meant that there was intent. And most importantly, one day going out on their own terms. Bowie did that.

Nat a bad final performance.

 

Last year will forever be known as the year when America was offended by absolutely everything. This statement has been made by countless memes and snarky posts all over social media. So why do I think the sentiment behind the statement is important?

Simply put; it illustrates the fact that the majority of people are fed up with rampant umbrage taking which swept the United States like whooping cough did in the 1920’s. It was almost impressive to watch. If you have ever seen a blizzard, it was a bit like that. Some light snow at first, which picks up in intensity and then before you know it is a complete white out. People are sick of being made to feel sick.

So what is at the core of the monster that has become well meaning outrage with a squeeze of misappropriated anger?

1. Publicity. First and foremost, publicity is what drives the industry of outrage as without it, it cannot exist. The amount of publicity that certain campaigns received was absolutely astonishing. However, that is more of a media concern and not so much the desire for publicity. So who am I referring to then when I mention publicity? Actors, Actresses, Pop-stars, has-been’s and never-will-be’s. Publicity is what fuels a celebrity’s career. So when the tank starts to run dry the car starts to stall. There is one person in particular that crops to mind whenever I think about the pathetic residue of a faded star and the lengths in which they will go in order to garner some sort of following again. I use these two following examples because I am on Facebook and Twitter enough to see their posts, daily. First off and I hate to say it, because I used to love the guy’s music… Talib Kweli. I don’t think that anyone revels in the death or misery of others, however when the deaths and misery of others happen to interest a small segment of your fan-base which is rapidly dwindling much like your talent and appeal, then all bets are off.  Yes, Talib we get it. You hate cops, white people and only care about people who have your same skin color. Isn’t that the definition of racism? On the opposite end, we have someone like James Woods. Who, while I enjoy the guy’s work and I agree with a lot of his points, is basically riding the wave of Conservative anger to it’s high point because well… what else is he going to do? Aside from seeing him in Ray Donovan three seasons ago, I can’t remember anything he has been in of note.
2. Greed. Do not think for a minute that an, “activist” wouldn’t take a paycheck. In fact, more often than not, they do take a healthy pay check and this is what fuels the more outspoken Social Justice Warriors of the world. Outrage is big business these days and it sure as hell beats getting up and driving to work. SJW’s are the new rock stars, because there are no real rock stars anymore. They are the youtuber’s nemesis as they actually have the guts to stand in front of people rather than a webcam to make asses out of themselves. They are loud, obnoxious and for some reason all still seem to shop at Hot Topic. Where there is money, you will find people trying to make a cheap buck. Greed is one of the more dangerous forces at work in our world. For a big enough sum, you can convince anyone of anything. Once you mobilize them, then the sky is the limit for outrageous rhetoric coupled with equally outrageous payouts. “Should I say this? I’m not even sure if these figures are correct and I have little to no idea what I’m talking about” translates to, “cha-ching!”
3. Jealousy. This is the plight of the non-affected. Those who aren’t a minority or if they are have never been harassed, aren’t transgender, homosexual, Muslim, foreign, etc. Everyone wants to be part of the crowd and if they can’t be naturally they will become part of the crowd unnaturally. It simply isn’t fair that someone else gets to be angry all the time. Regardless of whether or not you start off relatively happy, you should, if you CARE, be royally pissed off by the end of reading a Jezebel or Salon article. How dare … they? In a room filled with people telling half-hearted sob stories where everyone is crying in unison, you’d better damn well have a story of your own to tell or at least cry harder than everyone else. It is an obsolete, animalist pack mentality which kept our earliest ancestors safe but now serves no purpose other than to capitalize off of other people’s legitimate tragedies.
4. Boredom. Finally, good old fashioned boredom has a huge or as Donald Trump would say, “yuge” part to play in all of this. Coupled with a large chunk of stupidity. We as modern people have ridiculously short attention spans. We are the only generation of people who actually get bored with wars. Yes, people are still dying all over the Middle East. Because of social media, 140 character limits, memes, clickbait, statuses and Buzzfeed, people do not have the time to actually analyze an issue that interests or concerns them. Or at least they think they don’t and have convinced themselves they don’t because reading is yucky. So, they become instant experts on the subject because they have scrolled through a few pages and voila; they have a pet cause. This pads the numbers in the SJW front line but does no one any good. A thousand misinformed SJW soldiers will always be brought down by 100 thinking people. Unless those same SJW soldiers are louder, incredibly obnoxious, vitriolic, intolerant to any view other than their own and have pinker hair than the rest. Which is what 2015 was.

So why do I think 2016 may be the breaking point? Because as anyone who has screamed at a concert can tell you, after screaming for a while, you lose your voice. People are fed up with being told that they are part of a boogey man system which actually does not exist. Women are being tired of being told that they are victims. Men are being tired of being told that they are potential rapists. Minorities are tired of being treated like charity cases which must depend on white people to survive. White people are tired of being told that they are evil and have privileges that don’t extend past a Talib Kweli rant. Working people who collect a paycheck are tired of having it plundered by a government led by a president and party who have made it clear that they are going to do what they want despite the wishes of the American people.

So maybe the quiet will become loud in 2016. I hope so at least. Loud enough to make some positive strides towards normalcy in this nation and in this world. But not too loud. Because then there will be a rush on pink hair dye.

 

By now you have probably seen the picture of Amy Schumer which was taken by the famous Annie Leibovitz for the 2016 Pirelli calendar. If you haven’t, let me describe it for you. It is Schumer, in black and white, topless, sitting on a stool holding a cup of coffee with a travel lid. Hang on to that last bit until the end.

So what is the big deal? Absolutely nothing. However, it will become a big deal because that is what the newest crop of 3rd wave feminists want. The picture is more like bait than an expression or celebration of the female form. They are waiting in the wings, chomping at the bit to pounce on anyone who dare point out that Schumer is showing that she has a few more pounds than most women who decide to pose au natural. The, “how-dare-you” cannons are loaded and the anti anger-spiral pills ingested.

It wouldn’t be so eye-rollingly planned and planted if Schumer hadn’t been crucified by her own lefty compatriots for making racially charged jokes in her movie, “Trainwreck” last Summer. Ever since then; she has been a champion of gun control and now has taken a swan dive off of the Lena Dunham cliff into the shallow waters of 3rd wave feminism. What is the problem with that you ask? Here in a nutshell:

3WF to Glamour Model: “posing nude turns you into an object and helps further solidify the evils of patriarchy.”

3WF to Dunham / Schumer: “posing nude while unattractive and overweight is empowering! You’re such role models for young girls.”

What Schumer did is literally the least ballsy thing to happen in the last five years. Get what I did there? Nevermind. Anyway, she is well aware that anyone in a position to criticize her look publicly will be CRUCIFIED by the left for, “fat-shaming” or whatever is making co-eds cry and run to their safe spaces these days. Doing something that you know will automatically score you points with the people who already adore you while at the same time putting up a force-field of outrage around you is neither brave nor edgy. It is sickeningly safe and pathetically transparent. She took the picture for the benefit of the bulk of the ranks of modern 3WF; middle class, average-looking white women. A collective burst of blue hair dye and tears of joy must have sprung forth from Sarkeesian and Harper, two of the four horsewomen of the Whiny Apocalypse. Back to that coffee… when you think of the current, “uniform” for young, pretentious white girls in the Winter, what do you think of aside from Uggs, an Iphone with a pink case and flannel shirts? DING DING DING!! Yes, you are correct! A cup of overpriced coffee and a travel lid. Schumer holding the coffee literally made me laugh when I saw the picture. It would be like a picture, of I don’t know… Putin… shirtless, holding a hunting rifle. Ya know, something cheesy like that, created solely to appeal to a certain demographic. Oh wait…

“Amy and I have so much in common! I mean, just look at that picture! I bet she drinks soy lattes just like me.” – Girl who has been sold a bill of goods by a “feminist” who preys on her sensibilities.

Well done.

Ever since the attacks on Paris took place the issue of refugees seeking asylum in the United States has taken center stage. More to the point, Syrian refugees. Once again, the majority of the posts on social media have been of the snarky variety. The rest of the pro-refugee agenda has been pushed by what the left and their figurehead seem to gravitate towards the strongest; appealing to emotion and letting reason take a backseat.

President Obama yesterday:  “It’s very important that…we do not close our hearts to these victims of such violence and somehow start equating the issue of refugees with the issue of terrorism.” This argument only works if Paris had never happened and if the Tsarnaev brothers had never existed. There are times when a certain level of xenophobia is not only warranted but necessary in order to keep a populace safe. The term, “xenophobia” itself is being thrown around like a dirty word among the pundits, bloggers and talking heads of the American left at the moment in order to cover that fact. It is prudent to have a bit of arachnophobia when faced with a large spider that has crawled onto your bed. It’s prudent to be acrophobic when working on the roof of a house. It’s prudent to be aquaphobic when someone asks you if you’d like to go sailing during a hurricane. These phobias when confined to a certain amount of time are life-saving. Their brief existence when needed does not mean that people who experience them are going to go on a spider killing rampage, insist that houses be no more than 10 feet tall anymore and that sailing be banned and boats impounded.

The fear, or at least the argument of fear proposed by the left is; xenophobia can’t simply be, “turned off” and if we close our borders to refugees we are going against our core values, which have sustained the United States since it’s inception. It is interesting to note that when it comes to the prospect of refugees and undocumented people entering the country, the left will cling to the idea of core values based on American history and in the next sentence decry the evil’s of conservatism, mock the 2nd amendment and then proclaim themselves to be, “progressive.” I am not suggesting that xenophobia or any particular phobia is as easy to turn off as a light switch. However, in a country like the United States with such an influx of people every year and with such a complex “melting pot” (I hate that term) existence, that xenophobia would not be the law of the land after it had worn out its usefulness. We simply enjoy variety consciously or sub-consciously too much to be alright with stifling the potential of further variety.

So what is the motivation for the push for Syrian refugees to be settled in the United States by the left? That is a complicated question. But to my fellow conservatives, here are three reasons thrown around by the right which are laughably false:

1. The President is in league with radical Islam.
2. The Democrats are trying to secure people who would be beholden to them in elections.
3. Democrats do not care about the country.

Let me address these one by one. First, the President is not in league with radical Islamists. The reason being that I do not think he’s a sociopath and quite frankly, it just sounds goofy. I will be the first to criticize the man and his presidency but this reasoning is ridiculous. Second, while you can make the case for this, it takes generations to assimilate into a political culture which is nearly exactly the opposite of what your religious convictions tell you. Once a devout Muslim gains citizenship, do you honestly believe he or she would vote for a candidate that openly expresses support for gay rights? Think again. Finally, the idea of one group of people bound by political affiliation not caring about their country smacks of National Socialism. Both ends of the political spectrum are guilty of leveling this claim on each other and it is nothing more than a knee jerk reaction argument used when an angry person has nothing to say.

So again, where is the motivation? It is necessary of any ideology to believe in an oppressor class in order to sustain itself. The ideologue will be quick to point out what is wrong with absolutely everything and then when confronted with the question of how to fix it retreat to a bevy of whimsical musings about how things could be. Ideology is interesting, as it does not necessarily need to be bound to the scientific method in order to be proclaimed worthy of attempt. This makes for a very soft science. How are soft sciences sustained? Through the strength of conviction. The ideology of the left is fueled in its darkest, deepest corners by elements of socialism. Socialists are nearly obsessed with the idea of an oppressor class. Therefore, the streams of socialist ideology which leak into the more mainstream thought of the left is absolutely the motivation for the acceptance of refugees. The motivation lies in the fact that regardless of the projected utopian outcome of any social plan, or the stark contrast of the more than likely scenario of the opposite, the ideologue is at least half convinced that they are acting in the best interest of the people.

So in conclusion; I believe that at this time it would be in America’s best interest to keep our citizens as safe as possible and close our borders. A little xenophobia goes a long way when there is evil enough in the world to exploit a refugee crisis in order to use it as a jumping off point to murder the innocent.